Los Angeles daily herald., 1887-01-02

half dozen houses ana Q notei-wny
no lawns were keet, a. they are arcund
San Francisco, nAd was told that u
enough water were used to keep DOM
the orange trees and the lawns green
there would bs sickness. Yet projects
now In course of execution will bring
many thousands OF acres, now dry, un'
der cultivation by irrigation, and it ID
difficult to see why quinine should nct
become as necessary in Southern Cah-
fornia as in other regions in the same
latitude. .,,.
Finally. present prices of land in this
region. 40 far as they have any ratlonal
fonndationat all, rest upon the large
profits TO be made by the production OF
oranges, lemons. lines, raisins table
grapes, olives, English wa!nuts, ETC.
Without doubt the profits OF tins busi.
ness are large at present, but 1t Is not
likely thatthey will remain so. The
getting to market is an important factor,
and wRxe the great railroad corporation
which has, and b likely to retain,
monopoly of transportation In this
Quarter, is just now encouraging the de-
yelopment of the southern end of the
State. it will not always leave TO the
growers of these fruits the whole
Of their very largs profits. 1t is already
. complaint in the older parts of the
State that the railroad determine. its
freight charges by ''what the traffic will
bears" that is to say, it fixes upon each
kind Of freight such charges as will
leave the producer no more than mod
crate living profit. Its practice is to
take in freight about all that it can take
without stopping production: Hence
rates vary upon different articles, not at
ell in proportion to the cost of carrying
them, but solely in proportion to the
capacity of each to bear the freight
charges This psle, Il 0Asssd in South.
ern California, will inevitably render
the fruit culture of that country good
deal less profitable 10 the fruit growers
than it is now, if it now actually yields
returns to justify ST \ prices for land
as are asked and received.
l believe that Southern California has
fine future but I do not believe in the
boom" see every reason to expect .
collapse as the natural result OF present
speculation, and when the collapse
comes the whole region will be hurt in
its growth, for time at least. Mean.
time the prosperity of the central and
northerly parts of the State is much less
forced, much less speculative, and. l
think, much better founded in every
way. l wish every inch of California
well; but it seems to me time that the
truth concerning this insane "boom" in
the southern part of the State were
made known to those in the East who
are likely to become its victims. The
spectators have agents there whose
business it is to send people to Southern
California to buy lots in their new
towns, and the agents rarely carry little
hatchets on which to swear to the truth
fulness of their representations.
There is deal of beauty in this region
if one can accustom himsek to the con.
ditious which are depressing. The re.
gion as whole is desert, with oases
in it. The adobe lands of which 1t is
in the main composed are rich in all that
goes to make land fertile, and the soil
layer is very deep; the region is desert
only for want of water, and where water
is brought upon the land an oasis is
quickly made. But all is desert round
about, and that fact, together with an
other, depresses the mind with the feel
ing that the orange grove growths are
fictitious, like the gardens that children
make by breaking off twigs and sticking
them into .he ground. The other fact
to which allusion has just been made is
that in California the orchards and other
tree plantations must be kept con.
tinually ploughed and narrowed.
There is nowhere weed or a
bunch of grass; the trees seem
to be thrust into the ground rather than
to have grewn there, and it is difficultto
escape the feeling that they must wither
as soon as the sun grows strong. This
absence of spontaneous vegetation is
much completer in the southern part of
the Stste than around San Francisco;
and as there are beautiful lawns every
where in the San Francisco region, while
there are nearly none here, this part OF
the State seems raw and desOlate to one
who, coming from the East, where
kindly nature quickly clothes every
waste place in green, makes his first ac-
quaiotance with California in or near
San Francisco. G. c. Z.